No. 26: Jewish Christmas

On Monday, after dinner, my wife, Vicky, our son, Sebastian, and I went to the Firefighter’s Christmas tree lot and picked out a tree. Tashi, who’s 14, stayed home to do her hair.

Sebastian, who’s nine, dragged the tree inside and Vicky directed him to put it in the corner of our living room, right in front of a giant window facing the street. Sebastian closed the wooden blinds to make more room for the tree. The blinds have never been closed before, but I haven’t opened them. I don’t want the neighbors to see our tree.

I found a box of Christmas decorations stashed in our garage. There were kid-made Santas and a Rudolph made out of popsicle sticks, even a popsicle-stick Star of David. We also had a string of lights, we’d never used, and an unopened box of ornaments — quarter-sized animal faces.

Sebastian got to work. Tashi came down the stairs and with none of her usual teenage snark, she said, “Smells so good.”